To Put it One Way
by Lanie McCoy
Summary: As Kurama sits alone in the forest, an old friend comes around to say hello.


**Disclaimer: so I wonder, really, who thinks I own what.**

A random idea distracting me from other things, as random ideas usually do. Don't bitch at me if you don't follow everything. I don't think it all makes complete sense to me, and I know what's going on. …sort of.

_To Put it One Way_

It had been an age, it seemed, since their last mission. Time had passed cruelly, dragging the universe down with it in a slow trek towards death. The trees had never seemed quite so brown, the sky never quite so pale, but it was no use to say that this was not true. In truth, the trees were as lively and lush as they always had been, and the sky was just as blue and dotted with puffy white clouds, and it was lost on one man who sat by a small fire.

He knew the trees and the sky were just the same as they were, but that didn't mean he had to believe it. He could sit, content in the knowledge that he believed a false truth, and if someone were to ask him, "How blue is the sky today?" he would say, "As blue as it always has been."

But a small fire in the midst of the forest had never been quite so small as it was now.

The fire was, in all other respects, just the same as it might have been an age ago: sparking lively, dancing with colors golden and orange and red, containing itself in a safe and functional space—but a smaller space than it might have, for now it needed only to warm one cold man.

He fed it from time to time, toasting the water off of small sticks and throwing them in as kindling. But all the while, it stayed small and insignificant, refusing to grow, refusing the change its color to something warmer or more interesting. Refusing to become blue, or even black.

He smiled sadly at his common little fire of gold and red. He had seen black fire, an age ago. He had seen such pretty fire, such terrible and destructive fire, such dark fire that it burned even the strongest man.

These days, he didn't see black fire anymore. No, he saw only regular fire in fireplaces, or atop small stacks of dry logs and toasted twigs in the middle of a lush forest on a clear blue day. He had to make his own fire now.

"Why did it have to end?" he wondered. "Why did those wonderful days, full of friends and happy times and perfect lies, have to end? Why can't I find something to replace them? Why is nothing permanent?"

He felt the air move past his face in a small breeze, jostling his normal little fire and making the orange flames dance even higher.

"You always were one to ask silly questions," came a soft, deep voice from behind him.

"Well, you were never one to give silly answers," he said in a soft, lilting voice to the fire.

He smiled a little, letting his downcast eyes fall closed. He had always been the one to know the answers, hadn't he? The one to say, "This is right and that is wrong, and if I do not know, I will ask you a question you cannot answer."

And the other had always been the one who didn't listen, hadn't he? The one to say, "You cannot know what is right and what is wrong any more than I can, and when you do not know, I will be the first to remind you."

"I haven't seen you in awhile," he said. He heard a small grunt, a sound with such a tone that it was surely a precede to speech.

"As is only to be expected."

"I suppose so."

His eyes were still closed, and he heard his new companion sit beside him. There was no need to be silent in these woods. No demons would leap out from the shadows and attack, no battles would be waged by greedy and vengeful foes with twisted stories of reality.

It was, in a sense, calming.

A reminder of the old, old days. The days of childhood, the days of ignorance and lies. Not the so-called "new" old days, the ones of fighting and loyalty and tests of valor.

But it was, in another sense, most unsettling.

A reminder of the newest days. The days of lonesomeness, the days of knowledge and lies. Not the so-called "new" old days, the ones of friends and alliances and tests of will.

It was hard to prefer one over the other when they were so similar.

"Do you remember?"

He looked over, hair falling into his face a little bit. Just a few threads. Long. Pretty, glittering red.

Maybe not as red as it was an age ago.

"Remember?" he said, though he clearly knew what it was he did or did not remember. But he wanted to make sure of his hold on reality, so he asked his friend to speak.

The other nodded. "Do you remember happiness?"

He smiled. He did remember happiness, in a way. It was hard to know exactly what he had felt. He probably remembered feelings far beyond the ones he had actually experienced, far more gleeful and buoyant. Needing to promise himself that he had been happy, once, he needed to assert that he was miserable now. He needed a polar opposite with which to compare.

It was funny that he should need such a thing, but it could not be denied.

"No," he said, "not really."

He did not need to lie. Not to this friend who had been with him through so much, and who had seen so many of the same things. He did not need to say "The sky is as blue as it always has been."

The sky had been bluer once, an age ago. They both knew it.

"I don't, either."

That small assurance, those few words, held so little intended meaning that it suddenly became meaningful. What was it to the man who had spoken? Merely agreement. Merely reinforcement. What were they to him? Merely reassurance. You are not the only one in this world, they seemed to say, and you do not have to fight it alone.

"I want to remember happiness," he said. "I want to remember fun, and satisfaction. I want to remember love."

He looked into the fire again, which was smaller now than it had been a minute ago. The dancing had slowed, as though the beat of a different drum was not so different anymore, and the performers were tiring of the monotony of it all.

He tossed another stick—toasted earlier and made soggy again as it lay on the ground—into the flame and watched it catch.

Burn, he thought, sparkle with joy, and dance with energy, and burn with defiance, and smolder with love. Be everything I ever wanted to be, and I will watch.

"Is there no other way?" the visitor asked.

No other way to live my life, he thought, is the question you mean to ask. Is there nothing I could have done that I did not do? Is there nothing that could have made everything come out all right that did not happen? Is there nothing that could have sealed the lust I had for life that did not do its duty?

There is always something I could have done, he thought, because everything has two directions, at least. Maybe more. Maybe three or four or twelve or seven thousand or more.

"Not anymore," he said, "no."

"That ship has sailed, you might say."

"You might put it that way."

You might put it seven thousand ways, he thought, but it wasn't as though the world was very open about these extra answers. He had to find them himself, and he could not do that very often.

So he tried not to find them himself, but to let others help him find them. He tried his very hardest to let others help, to let others see a small bit of who—or maybe it would be more proper to say _what_—he was, in the hopes that they would help, just a little bit.

Pointless. All of it.

That ship, that lone vessel, had set sail when he had met those who might help him, so that the very solution had become the problem. He had a way to ask for help, suddenly, but it was too sudden. Too strong. Too great. He did not know what to do with such an offer, and he had turned it into an enemy. Something to hide from, to mask himself before. Something merely human.

He looked over at his companion with a tiny hint of humor in his eyes.

"I missed you, you know," he said.

"You find that somehow funny?"

"I do, in fact. Funny that I spent so much time hiding from you, and keeping myself secret from you, and then when you were finally gone and I finally had a moment's rest…I missed you."

"Me or what I stand for?"

He had no answer for that. Nothing to say, nothing to wittily remark, nothing to…think. He thought nothing of the topic. He had no answer, and he tried to formulate no lie. This was not the time, nor the place, nor the man. Truth was meaningless, lies more so.

Truth was meaningless.

They both knew all of the answers the other could provide.

But they fed off of each other, and they used one another as reflections with which to think out loud. Thinking the same things, they might learn something they didn't know they knew by hearing it from another version of themselves.

They were so similar, yet held so many differences…

They exchanged a look. The sort of look that says, "I am here and I am here for you. I understand you and I understand what you are going through. I am going through it too, so you are not alone."

"You'll leave me eventually, won't you?"

The other nodded.

"Just as you will leave me. We will tire of one another, and we will not care when we part ways."

"I don't know…I've grown rather fond of you."

"_Fond_ of me?"

It was true, it seemed, that he had grown to like his companion. Odd? Maybe. Neither had ever been eager to make friends. Yet now…if the emotion was reciprocated…

Well, let it be said that the each might be the only friend the other they had left in the world.

So then what would happen if his friend left him?

He might be the only left in his world.

Not in the grand world itself, per say. The world would not run out of people if his friend left him alone. But to say the least, his own heart, his own mind would be lonely…dark…empty. He would be there alone. The street signs would never stop blinking, the neon windows would never stop buzzing, the trees would never stop dying, and the water would never stop running.

He would be walking through a city of cold glass for the rest of his life, watching his own reflection, pretending it was good company.

Maybe, if he was very lucky, when he emerged from the cold glass city, there would be a hand waiting to pull him out.

Maybe, if he was very lucky, he would emerge from the cold glass city at all.

And if that hand was waiting when he finally stumbled his way through all the streets, when he finally finished the march from nowhere, then he knew to whom it would belong.

It would be the hand of his friend, the only friend he had ever really had, because they shared a common pain.

The common pain that drew them together, and the common pain that pulled them apart.

This was the pain that was impossible to understand, the pain that even those who harbored it did not quite know. The pain that formed chasms between lovers and drew enemies close to one another. The pain that perplexed even the most open-minded man, the pain that made answers clear to the most confused child.

This pain was not of a wound or a broken limb. No, this was the pain of a life of lies, a long and winding road full of traps and wrong turns, many of them taken.

"I've made a lot of mistakes in my life," he said softly. "Are you saying this is just another mark to put on my wall?"

His friend shook his head. "I don't know. I couldn't tell you. Do you regret it?"

"Calling you my friend?"

"Yes."

Why would one regret calling someone a friend? It was something that could be taken back, wasn't it? "I didn't mean to say that…"

A powerful and overused phrase.

In essence, it meant just the opposite of what it said. "I did mean to say that, but now feel that saying it did not benefit me or cause you to react the way I thought you would, so I want to pretend it never happened."

I will pretend it never happened…

What a notion. Oh, to think of people pretending they had not said what they had said. I told you a secret I should not have told you? Pretend I did not say anything. I told you a myth before you came of age to understand it? Pretend I did not tell you anything. To think what could be avoided if only people could pretend…

But what havoc would that create? Mistakes led to both terrible and mysteriously perfect things coming about. If he had never committed such heinous acts as he had, he might never have met his friend. Though he might now have better and more reliable friends, ones who would never question their loyalties to one another, who would never claim to grow tired of him.

The future was a blank slate to be filled, but what if this and what if that was always an annoying variable. Omnipotence was literally impossible, and who would want it, anyway? What a boring and predictable life that would be.

Yet…

Why not?

To know every trick and twist of the future, every pitfall fate would try to lead him into, and avoid each and every one?

A perfect life…

A tempting proposition.

But was it worth it?

"Are you glad to know me?" he asked uncertainly. His friend looked at him with a peculiar expression in his eyes.

"What sort of a thing is that to say? I am glad to have an ally as reliable as you."

What an uncomfortable choice of words. He shifted restlessly, staring into the slowly shrinking fire before him. It twitched, fearful of going out entirely, as though reminding him to feed it.

He tossed on another few twigs and smirked when it sparked, throwing little embers in his face.

"If you had the chance," he tried again, "to go back and rewrite your life…would you still lead it the way you did? Would you still lead it up to meeting me?"

There was no pause before the other's answer.

"Of course I would. You are a good companion and a trustworthy ally. I have no reason to ask for someone better."

Better?

There was someone better?

Trust, especially strong trust, was difficult and time-consuming to build. After being forced to, and continuing to of his own free will, form those ties, why would his friend bother to seek someone "better"? Someone more qualified? To do what, exactly?

And all of that came down to a single point…

That he was merely "good enough."

That was all.

Comforting, in a small, insignificant way: he _was_ good enough.

But then, in a much larger, more prominent, more striking way, it was quite disconcerting: he was good _enough_.

He would suffice. But he was not the first choice.

He wasn't special, just as the rest of the world wasn't special. He wasn't original, just as the rest of the world had long since lost its originality. He wasn't different, really. Just…better. Better than some others. Worse than some others, as well.

And what if he was the best? What then? Would he simply stop trying, or would he fight on in an insane desire to be better than the best?

If he who was the best tried to be better than the best, well, what then? An endless existence—not life—of exceeding expectations and going beyond the farthest limits his body and his spirit could reach. But what for, exactly? Always trying to be better than himself meant he would have no goal, no purpose for living.

But wouldn't it be fun?

Just for one day, even, to say "I am better than you and you and you. I am the best of all."

Wouldn't that be lovely?

"Do you like me?"

"_Like_ you?"

It was sweet, he supposed, how absolutely baffled his friend sounded. He had not even asked if he was loved; that was quite a different matter. That was "would you throw yourself upon a sword to save me?" But he asked merely was he pleasant to be around, was his company enjoyed?

"Why are you laughing?"

"Am I? I'm sorry… I was thinking of your response to my question. I had thought it simple, yet you so easily made it so complicated…"

"Well…yes, I suppose I do. Like you, I mean. Or as you said, I've grown rather fond of you."

That was all it took, then? Time. It took time to gain trust, time to accept trust, time to become accustomed to trust, and time to realize that trust existed.

Time was the key to all things good?

But time tore away bonds, broke down friendships, and threw hardships into alliances.

Time was the key to all things bad?

Or neither…

Maybe…it didn't even matter.

Maybe he didn't always need to know.

Maybe he needed to be content with what he had.

Time. Such a difficult thing to understand.

Maybe he should just stop trying.

Maybe things were okay.

Maybe life would go on…and he just needed to follow along.

The last embers of the fire had flickered and died. He stood, drawing a coat around himself and tossing his hair over his shoulder.

"Come on, my friend…we have a long way to go."

And Hiei stood, stepping closer to Kurama as they walked through the forest that had never been quite so green, underneath a sky that had never been quite so blue. They left the dead fire behind, a reminder of a world that might have been and a life that would no longer be remembered and friends who might not have been as true as they could be. The toasted and soggy branches lay beside the charred wood as a gravestone, as a memorial to a saga trying to close.

Their universe, the special places they had created within one another, would remain long after the epic ended. Their story might not live on, but that would be all right.

No one really needed to know.

While the normal, orange fire might have died, there was a completely abnormal, black fire burning inside them each. A shared trait, a shared pain, a shared memory.

Maybe things would all be all right…

They just had to stop trying so hard.

As they walked slowly, keeping an even pace with one another, the fire long forgotten in the dust…

The sky began to rain.

As it cleansed away all the horrible things they had discussed so briefly, all the terrible things they knew they had each done, all the miserable things others had done to each of them, suddenly…

Everything really was all right.


End file.
